#ah schroedinger's backstory...is the dog dead or alive...

[tanoraqui]

I mean I get why there's a lot of S&D fic for such a niche fandom with a frankly bizarre canon format. It's like you get a short prompt every day. Anyway, this is for this one.

“Animancer, don’t do this,” Barnaby begged, his hands flat on the wall of the magical confinement circle in which he was trapped. Across the basement, Kotetsu whined in ghostly pain. “Please don’t make me do this.”

Barnaby wished he knew the villain’s real name. She was definitely possessed, and real names were supposed to help with that. But they weren’t that good nemeses.

Animancer gave a gloating laugh, echoed eerily by whatever was giving her those glowing eyes and ectoplasmic horns. Some sort of demon, from what he'd glimpsed of the notes in her black tome of forbidden knowledge.

“Make you do what, St. Bernard, watch my plans come to glorious fruition?” She spread her arms, beckoning in the whirlwind of ghosts being pulled forcibly into the bloody pentagram in which she stood. “Well, tough luck! You’re out of your league and there’s nothing else you can do!”

She was pretty much right, unfortunately. Animancer had been a D-tier villain when they’d faced off before, for her cruel press-ganging of animal ghosts into her service for petty crime. But sometime between now and the pet cemetery incident last June, she’d escalated fast. Her lair was still just her oversized basement, but the cages filling it now held human souls as well, some from people she’d killed herself—and soon, all would be drawn into the ghostly vortex building around her, nothing but fuel for the demon she was summoning. And Barnaby was trapped behind a barrier which no mortal could pass, and which he couldn’t affect from inside it, while Kotetsu was trapped behind a barrier which no ghost could pass—while also being yanked toward the vortex. Kotetsu was pressed flat against the magical wall of his pentacle trap, making great canine whimpers of distress.

“Please,” Barnaby repeated, “do not make me use scary dog privileges!” (Morgan’s silly names for things were infectious.)

But Kotetsu started howling in pain, a wail matched only by the helpless ghosts of humans and animals alike being pulled into Animancer’s ritual, and Barnaby drew his phone and dialed. If the demon actually arrived, he’d really be outclassed. But if he could flip the tables…

Animancer sneered even harder, as the phone rang. “What, this ‘scary dog’?”

She waved her hand and the warding spell around Kotetsu vanished.

Kotetsu fell flat, then scrambled to his feet and started dashing toward Barnaby, racing to jump into the dog-shaped space in Barnaby’s spirit. Barnaby reached back the same way—

But neither of them was strong enough to withstand Animancer’s spell. Kotetsu’s paws scrabbled frictionless against the floor as he was pulled backwards. Animancer laughed maniacally.

“No!” Barnaby cried.

“Did you call me just to yell at me?” Alex asked, annoyed, from the phone Barnaby had forgotten he was still holding to his ear.

“No, I need your help! There's a demon being summoned, and it's going to consume all these lost souls from the neighborhood—”

"Hm, pass." Barnaby could practically hear the S-tier’s expression turn from bored to cruel. "Or you could beg me..."

Animancer threw her head back and started swallowing the ghosts, glowing brighter and brighter with each helplessly screaming spirit.

"Alex, Kotetsu is going to get eaten."

"Oh hell no!"

Barnaby heard the back half of the sentence in person as well as over the phone, as Alex appeared in the room without fanfare. They dropped their phone, grabbed Kotetsu by his floating, frantically doggie-paddling paws and yanked him down. Holding him close in one arm like a massively oversized toddler, they strode forward and side-kicked Animancer in the chest. She flew out of her bloody ritual circle and hit the opposite wall, hard.

The roar of the ghost-twister summoning spell diminished, though none of the ghosts actually vanished. They were still trapped here, wailing in distressed cacophony.

Alex's snarl cut cleanly through them as they advanced on Animator. "This is my dog. You do not touch my dog."

"He’s not your dog!" Barnaby called.

"My useless Dog Boy, too," Alex added, not missing a beat.

Animator struggling back to her feet, still glowing electric blue. Alex started to glow an extraordinarily menacing gold in reply.

Kotetsu recovered enough from his shock to phase out of Alex's arms and finally, finally get back to Barnaby. As always, melding with him was like being excitedly and lovingly tackled and licked all over, and all Barnaby wanted to do was scratch his ears (spiritually, physically, every which way) and tell him that he was a good boy, such a good boy, didn't the best boys not get eaten by demon-summoning ghost vortexes? Yes they did! That's what they did!

...but there were innocents to save. Now not entirely mortal for the moment, Barnaby ran easily through the pentacle trap’s wall, and made it to the other side of the room just in time to catch Alex's fist with dog-augmented strength before they yanked Animancer's heart out of her chest or something.

(Okay, dog-augmented strength and the power of being on the Do Not Kill List.)

"What now?" Alex snapped.

"If you pull the demon out of her, fully manifest like it was clearly aiming for, you'll get a better fight," Barnaby said quickly.

Alex stared at him judgingly. But they couldn't hide the way their snake-slit pupils dilated with bloodlust.

"Fine," they said finally. "But it'd better really be a good fight, Dog Boy."

They loosed their grip on Animancer's throat and grabbed her—or whatever it was—by the glowing ectoplasmic horn instead. They flew upward, crashing through multiple floors of Animancer's house without pause, dragging something behind them that screamed as it was torn out of Animancer's body.

Animancer screamed, too, in agony until the demon was fully out of her body. Then she collapsed.

Barnaby dropped to his knees to check her pulse. Alive!

“Kotetsu, out,” he ordered, and lost that full-body warmth of affection as Kotetsu rematerialized beside him—but they did exchange a few ear scratches and excited licks before Barnaby stood and ordered, “Watch over her and bark if she wakes up, or gets worse, okay? I’ve got to find her necronomicon.”

And then get her out of here before Alex decided rending the demon to ectoplasmic shreds wasn’t fun enough and they needed to deal with the problem at the source, and get some mild necromancy powers in the process. Barnaby looked up at the clashes of blue and gold, unearthly shrieks and equally chilling laughter now happening above. He probably had a few minutes. He really didn’t want Alex finding that tome, either.

He scuffed the blood pentagram open first, of course, releasing all the gathered ghosts. Some dissipated instantly; others flew off, charged up with pain or wrath. That was…probably also a problem.

Barnaby sighed as he set-to searching the garage for Animancer’s cursed notes. This was why he preferred working with Morgan. There were certain overbearing complications, but at least once a heist was done, foiled or not, it was usually done, instead of snowballing into extended ghost-hunts. Animancer’s basement lair didn’t even have puzzles, even though she’d classed up to nearly B-tier. It was just a mess.

#s & d tier #alex stewart #alex s tier #barnaby s&d tier #fanfiction #my fic #tragically i thought up a backstory for barnaby while writing this which contradicts a backstory for barnaby #i found in a fic which i really like #ah schroedinger's backstory...is the dog dead or alive...